


reached inside myself and found

by lamphouse



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Artemis is Smart, Coming Out, Dennis is Gay, Drinking & Talking, Episode Related, Episode: s04e13 The Nightman Cometh, Gen, Season/Series 04, Season/Series 04-05 Hiatus, Season/Series 05, Sex and the City References, written by someone who has never seen more than an episode of sex and the city
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-27
Updated: 2018-10-27
Packaged: 2019-08-05 00:56:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16357523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lamphouse/pseuds/lamphouse
Summary: please don't ask me to defendthe shameful lowlands of the way i'm driftinggloomily through time.Dennis is that special kind of drunk you only get when you're upset and know no one else will be around for ages. This is, of course, when Artemis shows up.





	reached inside myself and found

It's almost two in the morning by the time Dennis is well and truly into thick of his "miserable and alone" session.

He's been looking forward to closing the bar by himself for exactly this reason. Free beer, away from Mac and whatever weird thing has been building between them, away from Charlie and Dee's increasingly suspicious looks, nothing but him and the familiar sticky counter and hours left for wallowing is the exact kind of night he needs right now.

And, because the universe hates him, this is when the door clatters open.

"Knock knock, bitches."

Dennis considers drowning himself in the water at the bottom of the ice bucket. Instead, he emerges from his arms to see Artemis already stalking across the bar towards him.

"Man, it is deader than my Aunt Mimi's snatch in here. And on a Saturday night?"

"Dee's not here," Dennis cuts to the chase as Artemis slides onto the stool next to him.

Artemis shakes her head, leaning over the bar to pluck a few stale cherries out of their little compartment. She's dyed her hair back to brown again and it suits her, but Dennis really wishes he didn't know that, because he wishes she wasn't here, because he wants to be alone for once, goddammit.

"Oh Dennis, no," she says, not at all perturbed by his glare as she twirl a cherry stem for emphasis, "our sweetest Deandra is not the object of my quest tonight—"

"If you're here to bang my father, he's also not here, and I'd rather not hear about it."

Another cherry. Dennis is counting, and will be sending Dee the bill next time he sees her.

"Not that either."

Alright, now she has his attention. Dennis stops peeling at the label on his bottle and turns to face her single, impeccable, raised eyebrow with his own more dubious one.

"Okay, I'll bite. Why _are_ you here, Artemis?"

"You," she grins.

He doesn't know what he was expecting, but it wasn't that.

"Me?"

"A little birdie and a little rat told me all about your recent relationship drama, begging me to intervene."

So Dee and Charlie, sure, alright, but—

"What relationship drama are you talking about? I don't—"

Dennis knows. Dennis knows very well how he and Mac have been running circles around each other every day, refusing to be in the same room for longer than five minutes and being incredibly conscious of when and where they might touch when they are. He knows he's never quite able to hide how his attention immediately snaps to Mac every time he enters the room, how . Worse, he knows everyone has noticed, and every time he thinks about what they must think he feels a little sick, which is why he's sitting at the bar alone in the first place.

He's not going to tell Artemis any of that, though. He may be a little drunk, but he's not that stupid. Apparently it doesn't matter, though, as she just raises her eyebrow a little higher and continues to stare him down.

"This is no ambuscade, dear Dennis." She pats his arm consolingly. "Sweet Dee and Charlie aren't waiting around the corner to catch you if you show a weakness. Now come on, pass me that sambuca and tell Mama all your troubles."

Dennis is standing before he can give his feet permission to. "I'm the bartender," he says, rounding the corner, "shouldn't that be my line?"

He sets the bottle down so he can grab some glasses, but Artemis seems to have other ideas.

"Oh come on, man." When Dennis looks up, she's already taking a big swig straight from the bottle. "How am I supposed to know how much you owe if I can't count glasses?"

Artemis detaches from the bottle with more grace than should be possible. "Frank'll cover it, don't worry."

"I can't do this if you're going to keep reminding me that you're banging my father."

"Dennis."

Dennis pauses, about to pour his shot, and meets her eye.

"Would it be more helpful if we were getting high instead?"

Dennis drinks straight from the bottle. Artemis whoops.

"I just don't want to have to clean more glasses," he says, but his voice is hoarse from the alcohol so he sounds like even more a wreck. Great.

"Right." She takes a drink, then passes it back. "So, start from the beginning. When did you and Mac start banging?"

Dennis takes another drink to try to hide the panic in his eyes, but he's at it for so long that it probably has the opposite effect.

_Be cool, Dennis, be cool._

"I get why maybe _you_ would assume that, but not all of us are banging everyone we know."

Artemis waves her hand impatiently, her bracelets clinking lightly when they hit bar. "This would go a lot quicker if you didn't try to dance your way around every question."

"Why would I do that?" Dennis can hear his voice getting higher and higher, but he can't seem to stop it. Fucking sambuca. "I don't want this to be going anywhere at all!"

"Dennis, _Dennis_ ," Artemis grabs his face. Up close, Dennis can see every individual fleck of glitter in her eyeshadow, and he is a lot drunker than he thought if the way she's blinking is this mesmerizing.

"Dennis," she says again. Right, paying attention. "Are you and Mac not banging yet? Is that the problem?"

"What, why would we—" He jerks out of her grasp. " _Yet_? Why would we _ever_ —"

"Oh..." Her knowing grimace, eyebrow raise, makes Dennis want to throw up. "Is this the gay crisis?"

"No, I'm not having a, a gay crisis!" One of Dennis's sleeves gets caught on the lip of the bottle as he waves his arms around and he doesn't notice even as Artemis is a little too late on steadying it and some spills on the bar.

"Did you already have the gay crisis? Cuz if not, that's what this is." Artemis drags one finger through the spill and licks it up, fixing Dennis with a look that says she can see just how fast or slow his heart is beating.

"No, I..."

He had a response, his stock answer ( _Not gay, just really really vain_ , Dee's voice reminds him) ready at his fingertips, but it slips away just as easily as it usually comes.

"Oh..." She says again, now with even more meaning. "So you _have_ had the gay crisis."

Yes, alright, fine, Dennis _has_ had the gay crisis. He has, in fact, had a never ending series of gay crises, starting in the second grade when Dee asked who he was gonna marry at their joint wedding and his first thought was Pat, the boy with the nice eyes who lent Dennis his sweater when Dee got marker on his shirt on picture day, all the way up to last week when Mac was humping him on that dark stage and he was wishing they were literally anywhere else. The memories start racing past; that time he kissed Tim Murphy on a dare in high school, moving out of the frat house when the dick chugging jokes started getting a little too pointed and he got paranoid, waiting for nights when Mac was out raging with Charlie to bring home some dude, any dude, Mac— Just, _Mac_. Goddammit.

But he can't tell Artemis any of that. She might already know. Dennis has no idea how long he's been silent, standing there thumbing through an unfortunately familiar barrage of memories.

Artemis slides him the bottle. Long enough, apparently.

"So," she says while he takes a long pull, "is it Mac that's standing in the way then?"

"Mac's not gay," Dennis says when he finishes drinking. Even that feels like too much of an admission of guilt, the careful focus on Mac's side of the equation.

Artemis is more tactful than anyone gives her credit for, though, and just takes the bottle back.

"I'm sure he thinks that, but we all know that's not true."

"Well yeah, but, for the purposes of your totally insane premise, y'know, he'll never admit it."

She shrugs and drums her fingers on the bottle thoughtfully, the rings on her hand clacking against the glass.

"Maybe he doesn't need to." She grabs more cherries and offers one to Dennis this time. "Maybe you just need to start banging and the rest will follow."

"Why... would I do that?"

His arms feel a lot heavier than normal, so he folds them over the bar, and then, might as well, sets his head down on top of them. The puddle of sambuca looks so much shinier at this angle, and he can't even see his face reflected in it anymore, just the top of his hair and the lights on the bar behind him. Much better.

"Because none of you assholes are capable of just saying things."

She has a point. Dennis nods against his arms but stops when Artemis grins at him slowly, like a snake about to swallow you whole.

"There's nothing _to_ say," Dennis tries not to sound petulant, "cuz we don't wanna bang each other."

"How do you know?" She counters. "Have you asked?"

"No!" Dennis takes the bottle back from where she's been sliding it toward her purse on the stool next to her. While he's got it, he takes a drink.

"Mac thinks he's straight."

Another drink.

"And even if he didn't, he's my best friend, he wouldn't want to bang me, I mean, like, just because _I'm_ gay doesn't mean I'm in love with _Mac_."

He doesn't notice any of his several missteps until Artemis's delighted eyebrow raise catches up with the drunken delay in his perception.

"No no, I mean—"

"Dennis." She waves away his protests, blase and half-smiling. "You're fine."

She looks soft. Has Artemis ever looked soft? Dennis doesn't really spend enough time with her to know, ever since they met and she licked his face. She's always been Dee's friend, and then even Charlie's, and, okay, the thing with Frank. But Dennis has never spent any time with her. Maybe he should start.

"But if you ever need pointers on making love to a man," she continues, "you know where to find me."

"I do not need—" Dennis mentally reviews the various liquors they have behind the bar before straightening up, walking down to the opposite end of the bar, grabbing the rum, and slamming some before slumping back at his spot. Sambuca sucks. It makes him thoughtful, and Dennis does not want to be thoughtful for this conversation. "That is _not_ the problem. The problem is..."

He trails off, because the longer he thinks about it, the more problems he finds, an insurmountable pile of garbage that adds up to—

Artemis nods. "Mac."

Dennis sighs. Not the nicest end to his metaphor, but yeah. That pretty much sums it up.

"Look, just cuz the guy gets a boner one time grinding on me onstage during our friend's insane musical doesn't mean he wants us to fuck."

Artemis scoffs, the movement of her hair shaking loose a little glitter. She's doing something different with it now, all loose and wavy and full of glitter. Where does she get all that glitter? How? Why? Dennis kinda wants to ask, but she's already talking.

"You forget that I was at every rehearsal," she points at him. "Mac definitely had a boner more than once during that scene."

"That doesn't mean..." Dennis flaps his hand around cryptically. "It's just, like, friction. It's a bodily reflex, it doesn't..."

_Unless maybe it does?_

"I've ground down on my fair share of guys," Artemis is saying, and oh, he said that out loud, huh? "If they're not into you, nothing happens. Just a lot of chafing, and no one wants that, although with the right kind of powder and maybe even some essential oils—"

"Dude, gross—"

"What I'm saying is," Artemis cuts off his cutting her off, "he _is_ just that into you."

Dennis squints. He can't quite put his finger on what it is that has him so dubious, until...

"Are you trying to do a _Sex and the City_ thing right now?"

"That's what you're focusing on?"

To be fair, Dennis isn't focusing on much of anything. The sweet buzz he had had going before Artemis arrived was literally shot to pieces by the sambuca. Damn sambuca.

"Where were you when Dee was trying getting her girl gang?" Most of those words are right, so he keeps talking as he gets out a glass for his rum. It's not a shot glass, but it's not a pint, so whatever, fine, it'll work.

"And I'm not Miranda," he rambles, "if anybody's Miranda it's—"

Well, alright, it _is_ him, but that's besides the point, because now Artemis is smiling at him in a weird way. A nice way. Like a human person.

"I didn't know you were such a big _Sex and the City_ fan, Dennis," she says as she borrows his rum glass.

Dennis glares at her as he takes it back. "I was a gay twenty something in the nineties, of course I love _Sex and the City_."

A pause as he sips.

"You can't tell Dee."

A pause as he thinks.

"You can't tell her any of this."

A pause as he follows that train of thought a little bit too far, then shakes the fear out of his head. More rum. Rum is good. Rum would never betray him, spill all his deepest secrets like that slut sambuca.

" _Hey_."

He's not too busy drinking to miss the bottle disappearing from the bar.

"Slow your roll, Miranda." Artemis doesn't break eye contact as she puts the bottle in her purse.

Dennis glares at her, but his arms aren't cooperating enough to stop her. Such a Samantha.

"You know we're in a bar, right? That I own? Full of alcohol? That I also own?"

"So what are you going to do?"

Dennis, who had just turned to look back at the wall of bottles, turns back again, and as if the question wasn't enough to freak him out, it feels like his brain is spinning in his skull, sloshing overfull with liquor and thoughts, too many thoughts.

The stool on the corner. His only friend. Not much better, but at least he won't fall over as easily.

Artemis pats his head, a little patronizingly. Her hands are small and the rings on her fingers kind of hurt. Mac's hands aren't like that. Dennis can feel them now, broad and heavy on his shoulder, the warm weight of him leaning up against Dennis, the warm weight of him over Dennis—

Goddammit. Dennis tilts his head on the bar, oblivious to the peanut shells getting stuck in his hair, and squints over at Artemis. She's texting someone, unimaginably composed.

"I hate how sober you are right now," Dennis mumbles as he turns back to the wall. Little lights are swaying in the glass. There's an old, old picture of him and Charlie jammed in the shelf and Dennis looks at it and only sees, so clear, Mac behind the camera, lost on whiskey and smiling so, so wide.

In the present day, Artemis shrugs. "It takes a lot to get me going."

"Yeah, I galler— Gathered."

She puts her phone back in her purse even as it vibrates again, turning her full focus back on Dennis like a laser beam. Dennis hates laser beams.

"What are you going to do, Dennis?" She asks again.

"Why do you care?" It's only just occurred to him to ask—he must be drunker than he thought.

Artemis is a very honest person—this is something Dennis is learning about her.

"Because now both Dee and Charlie are complaining to me about you two, and it's infringing on my time spent outside this whirlpool of a group." She tilts her head at him, and when Dennis subconsciously mirrors her, she smirks. "And I like you Dennis. You're never as much of an asshole as you seem."

As much as he knows that it's not true, that he is that much and probably even more of an asshole, it still feels nice.

"Is that why you licked my face when we first met?"

Artemis smiles serenely back at him. "I was in character. What about you?"

The words get all muddled in the distance between the air and his ears, becoming some muddled amalgamation that felt like caked stage makeup and tasted like wine coolers and stale weed and smelled like nothing but the disgusting blend of Mac's four hundred colognes and feels like he's drowning.

"Dennis, what are you going to do?"

He isn't sure if she actually says it again or if it's just stuck on repeat in his head.

"I don't... I don't know if I _can_ do anything."

"Whiskey dick? Been there." Artemis nods sagely, and this time, it pisses him off a little, and (in his intoxicated state) that little becomes a lot.

"No!" Dennis bangs his hand flat on the counter, but it's weak, like a kitten. "It's just, it's Mac, y'know?"

God, he wishes he had the bottle still, if only just for something to hold onto. Instead he stares at all the little nicks in the bar, pulling liquor around with his fingertips, tracing them into constellations.

"It's like— I have this hole—"

"Mhm."

"In my heart—"

"Oh. Sure."

"That only Mac can— What?"

"I thought you were going somewhere different." Artemis shrugs. Dennis makes a face like she's suggested the most disgusting thing he's ever encountered, and he's seen Charlie after many a rat bashing marathon.

"No, dude, gross, I—" Actually, he starts to think about it, and gets stuck thinking about it, imagining further and further, into detail... "Well I guess—"

He shakes his head like a kid whose goldfish is just floating there, lifeless, still, shakes his brain back into focus.

"It's like a hole in my _heart_ , man, or like, just the whole hole me in gen'ral, and the only thing that makes me feel whole is Mac and what if that just stops, I mean, we've known each other _forever_ , I dunno how to _not_ be around him—"

Dennis isn't totally sure what happens next (there's something about crying, handing Artemis his keys, his other keys, all his keys) but somehow he ends up slumped in the passenger seat of his own car as Artemis stops in front of his apartment.

She shuts off the car, cutting off the weird late-night EDM mix mid-drop, just as Dennis blinks back into existence.

"Alright," she twirls the keys (it's just one set, and he knew that) once around her finger before pressing them into Dennis's hands. "Go get your boy."

Oh, right, that's why he shut down. The panic starts to flood his system, but his limbs won't cooperate, already propelling him out of the car, and his mouth won't cooperate, already asking, "How are you gonna get home?"

She waves her phone around, which buzzes even as she speaks. "Unlike you dicks, I have other friends." Then, honest again, "Don't worry about me."

He nods, an unnatural jerking motion that almost knocks his head into the door frame. He glares at the door as Artemis's laughter recedes into the night.

"And Dennis?"

He almost drops his keys as he turns to see her walking backwards down the street, her grin confident and consoling. The streetlight nearest her makes every slow blink of her eyes flicker brightly. Artemis is a very shiny person, Dennis has learned.

"Wait until you're sober enough to mean whatever it is you're going to do, m'kay?" She pauses. "For both your sakes."

Dennis has never seen Artemis serious, and he doesn't like it. Every part of him is screaming to fuck it up on purpose, even as he stands there, stuck, pinned by her gaze even as she turns back down the street and starts shouting down her phone at someone, distant bass thumping from the receiver.

A car passes. Dennis is up the stairs, fumbling with his keys again. It stops him just long enough for his brain to catch up with his body.

What's he going to say? What _can_ he say? _Mac, have you ever thought about— Do you maybe— Hypothetically, if you were— If I were— If we—?_

He yanks open the door, gets distracted by the end of his sleeve which he sees now is wet. After a cautious taste, he concludes that it's alcohol of some kind. He doesn't really have the focus to figure out which, just that it's an intoxicant. That's all he needs. He doesn't even think to worry about the shirt wrinkling.

The first thing he sees when he gets in their apartment is the red blink of the clock on the TV. It says it's almost four, but that doesn't quite sound right, and Dennis wonders for a second how the hell Artemis has found something new to start at this time of night, and then—

His eyes follow the light and see Mac on the couch. He's slumped into the far corner, hair limp, drifting until Dennis lets the door fall shut behind him.

There are many things Dennis could do right now.

He could turn around, disappear into the bar until he's sober enough to subsume all the right reckless urges, not answer when Mac asks why he didn't come home last night, never think about tonight again.

He could keep Mac half asleep, smoothing hands over his shoulders, walk him back to his own room and start over in the morning ( _sober_ , Artemis reminds him).

He could lock himself in his room for the next four months until he withers away.

He could fold himself up in Mac's arms.

He could move to Boston or Seattle or Belgium or a cave in the Himalayas or the fucking moon.

He could tell Mac he loves him.

He could go throw up in the bathroom (though he'll probably do that regardless).

He could sit down next to Mac on the couch with his head on Mac's shoulder, still not talking about it but at least, for tonight, giving just an inch.

He could keep walking as Mac asks what's up, tug Mac off the couch, clumsily drape his arms over Mac's shoulders and kiss him with the last of his concentration, drag him into his bedroom, into his bed, keep going further and further, his hand down Mac's sweatpants, until, yes, he could throw up in the bathroom as the liquor catches up to him, Mac's hand on his back, still not saying anything, and he could eventually drag himself back to bed only to fall asleep in Mac's arms.

(In the end, he goes with the last option. All things considered, it's not the worst he could do—though he's not sure which that would be. It doesn't matter once he takes that first step. There's nothing that could stop him.)

**Author's Note:**

> okay first off dennis and artemis are probably my two favorite characters on this show and it's criminal that they've only really interacted twice (it's criminal that artemis isn't there more in general, but that's besides the point).
> 
> SECOND mac and dennis were banging in season five and y'all can pry that from my cold, dead hands. so this is how it happened—or, okay, how dennis realized that he wanted it to happen, that it could happen. anyway i miss season five dennis. where is my misogynistic but also soft and codependent geek? where has he gone? when will he return? please i miss him
> 
> also idk if you can tell but i've been reading a LOT of virginia woolf lately, so this is a stylistic oddball, i know, but it's on purpose and i hope you enjoyed.
> 
> title and summary clip from "[the sun always shines on tv](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3ir9HC9vYg)" by a-ha. i'd apologize but i truly couldn't help it—i've been on a real eighties kick lately and, i mean, come on, it's a banger, the lyrics are perfect, AND its the song they named the show after, did i really have any choice?
> 
> tumblr @[lamphous](http://lamphous.tumblr.com) and @[sensitiveintellectualtype](http://sensitiveintellectualtype.tumblr.com) (sunny sideblog)


End file.
